I Watched Richard Donner's Superman For The First Time, And There's One Thing Christopher Reeve's Man Of Steel Debut Still Does Better Than Other Superhero Movies (2025)

I waited far too long to watch Richard Donner's Superman, but I put it on one night on a whim whilst wearing my Meta Quest 3 VR headset, and wow, it holds up. Not only that, but I think upcoming DC movies and even upcoming Marvel movies could learn from it, thanks to the incredible setup work it does in the opening parts of the movie.

Now, we already know James Gunn's Superman movie won't be telling the hero's origin story, and seeing as it's been over 80 years since the character's creation, I think it's fair to speculate that everyone knows it by now. That's thanks in no small part to Christopher Reeve's film that came before it, which expertly told all the sweeping highlights of the hero's origin better than any film before or after it.

Richard Donner Expertly And Efficiently Told Three Complicated Stories In Under 30 Minutes

I would wager that even in the 1970s, people knew the gist of Superman's story, but that didn't stop the movie from finding a neat and tidy way to hit all the big notes in under thirty minutes. We see the trial and banishment of Zod, Ursa, and Non, the Kryptonian government ignoring Jor-El's warnings about the planet's impending destruction, Superman's escape from the planet, and his adoption and upbringing by the Kent family, followed by his father's death. It's phenomenal and exactly what it needs to be. Nothing more, nothing less.

Too often, superhero movies have used an entire film to tell a hero's origin. This movie condenses a large bulk of it all to the first third of the movie, and while there are still some "firsts" happening after, like his job at the Daily Planet and such, it's the story firing on all cylinders in a way we don't see today. It finds a way to mesh both the origin and an entertaining story in a way other hero movies have struggled. For example, why does every Batman movie have to show Bruce Wayne's parents being killed? It's just filler at this point, and if you can't give it the attention to really make it meaningful to the movie, just leave it out. If you have to tell the hero's origin, all filmmakers should use the Richard Donner blueprint.

Why We Probably Don't Talk About This As Much As We Should

I think that while Richard Donner's Superman gets its flowers, it's typically people praising John Williams' iconic theme or Christopher Reeve, who essentially became a real-life Superman in his lifetime. The way the origin story is told doesn't get a lot of love, and I think it goes back to a point that I made earlier.

Superman is one of the first superheroes in pop culture history, and his story is old enough to be someone's great-grandparent. Had the movie started with him being found by the Kent family in a space capsule, I don't think anyone in the theater would've been confused about what happened previously.

Even so, I firmly believe that Richard Donner's Superman is the gold standard for the perfect way to lay out a superhero origin, and all movies should aspire to tell a story so cleanly. At a time when it feels like we're about to enter a new era for the superhero genre as a whole, it's a fact that needs to be said.

Superman is currently available to stream with a Max Subscription. Watch it now, especially if you're someone who hasn't seen it like I was just a week ago.